TaxAct Online question

[Bearded Man]

I'm using TaxAct Online free edition to do my taxes this year instead of paying for a CPA (I own rentals, etc.)

One thing I'm curious about is whether I am supposed to calculate my entries before entering them.

For example: for the mortgage interest deduction question/field, do I enter the amount I calculate (paid $1,000 x 28% tax bracket  = $280 into the textbox)or the actual amount paid ($1,000) and it does the tax bracket calculation for me based on my W2/income information already entered?

[megamomo]

You just enter the mortgage interest paid.  That should be box 1 of your 1098 from your mortgage company.

In all cases that I can think of, there are never any calculations that you need to make (at least for the basic items most people have on their taxes).  The software handles all of that.

[Bearded Man]

That's what I thought, but the way the question for mortgage interest was worded ("DEDUCTIBLE Mortgage Interest") with the emphasis by me, it made me stop and wonder if I was wrong to assume that the application had those conditions and calculations built in. Glad to know for sure now, thanks.

[Sibley]

The reason it was asking for deductible mortgage interest is that if your balance is over a certain arbitrarily defined amount the interest for that portion is not deductible. Also, I believe there are (or were) limits for second homes and HELOCs.

In general, tax act is intended for people who have no idea what they're doing. Keep that in mind.

[GizmoTX]

Our 21 year old college student son used TaxAct Online this year to compute & file his taxes from a summer internship & school job. With my guidance, he has used IRS paper forms, H&R Block online, & TurboTax online to do similar past returns. TaxAct was the most straight forward & least tedious, except for all the attempts to add on products during the process. We don't have state income tax so he was able to file online with direct deposit of his refund for free. It's a good teaching tool & he'll likely use it again next year.